


there's a world out there (so keep your eyes open)

by iuniore



Category: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: (hinted) - Freeform, Character Study, Gen, Gender Identity, Religion, Self-Discovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:15:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22260067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iuniore/pseuds/iuniore
Summary: A nobody wakes up in a weird, slightly cold room and does not know who they are.A journey of self-discovery after a hundred years of forgetting.
Relationships: Link (Legend of Zelda) & Old Man Ho Ho (Legend of Zelda)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 18





	there's a world out there (so keep your eyes open)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Yours Truly](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17561315) by [nothing_special](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothing_special/pseuds/nothing_special). 



> hey! thank you for reading :3 first fic of 2020! happy (late) new year to every one ♡ i hope you enjoy! (this was written in procrastination of a larger revalink fic so, if you're interested, stick around! update: that fic has currently been postponed until i get back into botw... i am so sorry)
> 
> some slight warnings that aren't big enough to use as tags:  
> -food mentions  
> -imagery involving scars  
> -animal death (hunting)  
> -past character death (if you've played through the great plateau, you've seen it)

When Link first lies in the Shrine of Resurrection, he remains conscious.

The gentle lull of the water brings him closer to sleep but there is a sharpness across his body that refuses to let him go. His mind feels as though it can barely think and, yet, it is a constant stream of thoughts, of memories, though he focuses on none of them, letting them drain away like drink from a broken glass. 

He hates this room, Link decides. It is empty and boring, with nothing of interest. Not that he can see, anyway, from the water bed that chains him. He can barely even turn his head; when he manages, with great effort, there shines the orange constellations that the Sheikah were always so proud of. What good did it do.

They’ve failed.

Link knows it, deep in his bones. The Divine Beasts did not fire and Link can only hope that the other Champions had regained control over the issue that cursed them. Zelda had not unleashed her power, even when confronted with the once-tame Guardians.

Link knows his failure is worst of all; he would not be locked away if it weren’t. 

_He’s not bitter_ , he reminds himself, feeling incredibly so.

From then, he takes the time to notice some more, if only so he doesn’t focus on the pain that’s ricocheting through him, or the anguish of emotions that makes his gut spasm. There’s a sticky substance on his chin, that dribbles down his neck into his shirt and below his collar; there is a lot of what Link comes to realise is blood. A cool burning sensation, like hellfire, scratches at his arm, begging to be itched. When he thinks about it too long, he can see the image of a fiery red with swirls of black stream past him, erupting into flames.

He doesn’t get to think about it for more than a moment because, in seconds, he’s asleep. There he will remain for the next one hundred years.

A nobody wakes up in a weird, slightly cold room and does not know who, or where, they are. They know how to talk— in many languages, even, not just the one that’s name they can’t quite remember— and they know of things like maths and science and magic, but nothing much of the world it’s applied to. 

“Link.” A voice says. They sound peaceful, almost serene, just like the waters that slowly sink around then. There is nothing on their skin and they take the time to notice it. It doesn’t feel dry either, just soft as if it had been moisturised.

They raise their hands, which wear the heavy lines that have begun to fade, like a once-dogeared page that had been flattened and refolded a few too many times, as the bookmark was always lost somewhere. Simply focusing on the small hairs, the patches of freckles and moles, and what seem to be remnants of scars that decorate their arms and legs like a diary of close calls, they explore their body, treating it like china and touching it so gently that they can barely feel the sensation. Maybe they were a fighter once, or maybe they were nothing at all, just going along with whatever life chose for them; either way, they do not know.

The voice continues to speak to them, walking them through this strange place. They do not recognise it at all, not when they see the Sheikah slate, nor when a gaping hole opens in the building, letting them gaze upon the sun for the first time in… Who knows? Maybe it’s the first time they’ve been let out from this place.

The clothes they wear cling to them and it’s suffocating. A nobody- or, perhaps now, a somebody named Link- recognises the feeling of discomfort and catalogues it in their empty brain. They don’t like that they have clearly felt the sensation before but hold no memories of it.

Rather than just stand and take in the beauty of the world around them— which would be quite easy to do, with all the lush trees and the beautiful songs of life— Link decides to head down the cliffside, examining the ground beneath them as they go. It’s quite the worn-in stone path, with half of the sunken cobblestones being hidden by the dirt. Small weeds grow around the rocks too, like a small forest. Link picks up a tree branch as they pass, clinging onto it like a walking stick. It feels familiar, and comforting, to hold something in their hands again, the weight making him feel almost balanced.

At the bottom of the hill awaits an Old Man. Link knows they’re an Old Man because he introduces himself as such. He wears an all-black outfit that makes the white beard that gathers on his chin and neck stand out as if it was a shining cloud in the middle of a thunderstorm. 

They also find out, from what they could barely call a conversation with how short it is, that they are a ‘young boy, and he had discovered that when the Old Man insisted on referring to him as ‘Young Boy’.

Link finds he cares little for matters like this so he continues walking around, following wherever his eyes take him. He arrives at a building before long, an axe heavy on his back, which has a massive shrine inside, towering so high it almost reaches the roof. Link thinks it might be the prettiest thing he’s ever seen, and then realises that it doesn’t mean much when you only have ten minutes of experiences.

Still, he knows what to do when he sees it, like the sacred ritual is embedded into his very being. The statue shines with a mystical glow, a mix of greens and blues and yellows that somehow sparkle, even with no tangible mass. When he approaches, his head is lowered; he knows that’s how you show respect, with a lack of eye contact. Despite the aged stone seeming uneven at best, Link decides to kneel anyway, bowing so low his face almost meets the puddle of water that surrounds Her feet.

“The Goddess smiles upon you.” Link hears in the wind, an angelic chorus. A warmth floods through him and he commits every aspect of it to memory. The hard stone on his knees and the sway of glistening water on top of grey bricks; there are miniature statues that surround Her, something like angels. The feeling he focuses on more, though, rather than the setting. The shooting pains that are beginning to settle in his knees and the feeling of a rising sun burning against his cheeks through the shattered windows. Most importantly, the feeling of pure bliss that makes the first gasp of air in his lungs feel like nothing significant.

When he leaves the shelter of his temple, a wind that's not too fierce, nor cold, but enough to blow through his thin excuse for clothing, pushes against his skin, blowing back his hair so it flows behind him. Distantly, hidden beneath the rubble of his broken mind, he knows that he has missed this, missed the feeling of life itself. Halfway through his journey to where the voice in the Slate directed him to— from which he had gotten distracted from, when he had been a mud pit and a tree stump and felt an odd sense of unpurgeable curiosity— he ends up in the middle of a forest. There is an angry rock creature, which he thinks is called a Talus, and it is very mean so Link continues on his way. He sees a few deer, though they are so skittish that they’re gone before he can even register them. A couple of boar graze near him too but they are much less tolerant and often charge at him.

Once again, he meets the Old Man, this time by a small fire and a cooking pot. 

“You can use the bow there if you wish.” He says, pointing to his side. There is indeed a bow there, small and wooden, almost minimalistic. Beside it is a quiver, scarce in arrows. The Old Man is not apologetic because Link is receiving it for free. Grateful, he accepts it and sets out again into the woods, following the Old Man’s advice of hunting the boar; his stomach has already started rumbling, from all the exploring he’s managed to do, and the delicious fumes from whatever the Old Man is cooking is enough to make anyone’s mouth water. Maybe, Link wonders, it is the first time he’s ever eaten.

Link spends the rest of the day in the Forest of Spirits. It’s enjoyable there, a nice first taste of what life is supposed to be like, even if the place’s name suggests it is where the dead come to rest. There’s nothing magical about the place, despite its name, except for the little forest dwellers who are shy and only appear once their riddles have been solved and a rock has been pushed into its place. Their giggles are cute, Link finds, and he often goes out of his way to search for them when there are much more important tasks at hand: namely, the Bokoblin camp that is less than happy to see him, if the sudden shower of rocks is anything to go by.

When he rests up for the night, he makes sure to steer far away from that area. Even so, he can still hear their loud chanting and screaming and the pounding of feet into hardened earth, an old ritual; it seems everything has a part of its culture embedded within. There’s an opening in the trees, from which the stars shine brightly through. The moon is just a little slither in the expanse of a rich purple sky and Link cannot remember the technical name for it, not that he remembers much. It doesn’t bother him as much as he thinks it should, though the euphoria of the day has him unable to focus on much else. 

Link can only hope that the following days are as kind.

He thinks he dreams that night but, like most other aspects of his life, he remembers little. Or nothing, truth be told. Nothing.

And he feels empty. The high from yesterday has dwindled, leaving him… Empty. Numb, maybe. For Hylia’s sake, he hadn’t even remembered his _name_ before someone— who he also doesn’t know— told him of it. Truthfully, he is a foreigner in his own body, a stranger to his toned stomach, his aching calves, to the long blond locks that hang from his head. 

The only reason he has any idea of what he looks like is because he saw his reflection in the passing waters of an icy river. Through the mirror in the chilled ice that hung around the edges of the surface, he had looked awfully pale, though a muted red was still visible upon his cheeks. He touches his face as he sees it, outlining his green eyes, dragging his fingernails along the edge of his eyebrows, pressing so deep it stings from the bitter air. Link watches himself as it happens, confirms that it is him, but it doesn’t really feel true, even so. 

The curve of his lips is unfamiliar, as if he’s never wetted them with his tongue before, or bitten them when anxious. They feel perfectly soft, if a little chapped from his days in the wild. Like stars, freckles decorate his cheeks, although faint, but he doesn’t even know they’re there, the water rushing too fast and frothy for him to make them out of its image. Months will go by before Link discovers them, when he’s in a house in Gerudo Town, passing by a mirror as he helps to make three cups of tea.

When the sun is just before its peak again, Link reaches the Shrine; each one teaches him a valuable skill, one that he doesn’t think he ever had before. He’s not too good with Magnesis, which he had been taught in the Shrine of Oman Au, and not much better with Cryonis but, at least with that, he can control where the ice pillar would be, even if it takes him some time to figure out. Magnesis feels like everything that he carries has become weightless and, more often than not, it ends with something breaking. He tries not to use the runes unless he has to; Link isn’t yet comfortable even in his own skin.

Snow is difficult to traverse in at the worst of times, and there’s no exception for when its up to his knees and is attempting to escape a pack of hungry Lizalfos. By the end of it, when he’s almost throwing himself off the mountain, he counts his injuries. One aching shoulder, sliced with the sharpness of a Lizal boomerang; one aching waist, from a deliberate jab with the hard end of a spear; and two throbbing wrists, from a stumbling fall where he just wouldn’t stop rolling. Overall, not too shabby, given whatever the scar in the middle of his chest was from. Sometimes, it still hurts, especially when he’s been out of the sun’s gentle kiss for too long. Whatever that is feels like it must have killed him.

Still, Link thinks it’s time to rest, given that the opportunity appears rather quickly after the incident. First, he notices the smoke that rises from an open fire. With a little bit of focus and some squinting, he can make out a firepot above it, through the thick, oak wood forest, and the Old Man, again, sat beside it. To Link, it truly seems like he is alone on this plateau after all, given that he’s almost seen it all.

“Ah, Young Boy!” the Old Man roars, as if it’s the most exciting thing that’s happened all year. Given how desolate the place is starting to become, Link wouldn’t really bet against it. “Care to join me?”

Link glances at the pot, which seems to have a few peppers cooking in it to make a sauce. Within it, there’s a slab of boar meat. It smells quite nice, if a little plain.

“What are you cooking?” Link asks instead, choosing to sit on the floor. The ground is dusty so he folds his hands politely on his knee. With the clothes he’s wearing, Link doubts the extra dirt would hurt anyone, nor even be noticeable. 

“It’s an old recipe, I believe, that I used to cook when I was in my prime.” the Old Man informs. “But, for the life of me, I can’t remember the ingredients. I must have failed to write them down in my haste to eat it!”

Link laughs along, though it doesn’t seem overly funny. This guy makes him uneasy, and it makes Link feel horrible for thinking so, as he’s shown nothing but kindness with little reward in return. 

“Maybe some more meat.” Link suggests. The sauce overwhelms everything else, leaving the small meat slice looking awfully lonely. He takes another whiff of it before adding, “Fish maybe?”

“Ohoho! We have a chef in our midst!” The Old Man cries, unnoticing when Link flinches back slightly. “You wouldn’t mind fetching some for me, would you?”

Link sighs.

It turns out travelling at night is much safer than that of the day, given that the Bokoblins also live off the same sleep patterns as he should be following. Exhaustion settles in his bones as he makes his way across the fields. Absentmindedly, Link wonders whether he’s stayed up late before, whether he’s watched the sun set and rise again, all in a night. Maybe he has always lived in that weird room he woke up in, not even three days ago. Trying with all his might to remember something, anything, makes him come up empty again. And again, and again, even when he stares at the skyline in hopes of recovering any piece of the burnt puzzle.

Has he ever watched the stars with someone, keeping his hands wrapped tightly in someone else's? Or has he snuck out late at night to find something, some _one_ , because of a bout of insomnia like what he feels now?

Whenever he looks at this place, the _great_ plateau, it feels unlived in, lacking stories that make it nice to travel through. But when he looks out into the world, like when he was on the Sheikah Tower, it felt like there was so much more out there, hidden in the mountain ranges and winding rivers and the small, fading lights from a distant civilisation.

When Link looks to Hyrule, it tells him that he’s not alone.

So he continues on, wondering whether there’s someone waiting for him. Hoping for it, even. He barely remembers to roll up the leg of his trousers before stepping, barefoot upon slippery rocks, into the water, moving slowly as not to disturb the fish; not that it does much for him, given they swim away at the faintest sign of trouble. Eventually, he gives it up and tries another approach, rising from the top and forgetting about keeping dry.

When he sees that faint slither of orange on green, he dives as gracefully as he can manage for his first time and comes up victorious, a fish gripped between his two hands, twisting and jerking to be free. He loses himself in the walk back to the Old Man, the adrenaline from the successful catch keeping him happily distracted. Thankfully, his mind remains wonderfully empty and he only reawakens to the real world once he’s reached his destination.

Link enters the house, with the Old Man’s permission, and begins preparing the fish. It doesn’t take long as the process seems to come back to him. He cuts and slices, and salts where he should. He brings the fish back quickly, adding it to the dish.

There’s something familiar in the heavyweight of a knife, the careful positioning of his fingers to assure there’s no blood in the food he serves. Link finds he enjoys cooking and wonders whether it was a hobby of his once, as something in him seems to recognise how nice it feels to cook for someone. He makes a mental note of it as something to explore later, repeating it like a mantra so it sticks in his head like a post-it note.

The pot sizzles as the food begins to cook, the aroma filling up the entire area around them. The Old Man hands him a metal plate, taking a slice of meat and fish with a healthy scoop of sauce. They swap plates again, and the Old Man makes up his own portion.

“Let’s eat!” He says, digging in. Delighted after a single bite, he exclaims, “Well, this is it! I must make sure to write down the recipe.” He heads inside quickly, almost discarding his plate on the table to cool so he can rummage through his cupboards for a notepad— the opposite of what he had done many years ago.

Link continues eating, scraping the plate dry. A few minutes pass before the Old Man returns, seemingly having finished all his rustling, holding a green tunic with brown straps. 

“Now, I don’t know whether you’ll have any need for this but I suppose it won’t be fitting me.” With that, the Old Man gives him the Warm Doublet to keep him warm in the colder regions on this place. Though his clothing manages to keep him comfortable enough, the thicker layers that actually cover his midriff will be appreciated. Not to mention that it isn’t riddled with holes.

The next day, Link finishes up the last of the Shrines. He has the faintest inkling that the Old Man expected him to be quick about it but he’s taken his time, letting himself explore the plateau until his curiosity was satisfied. By the time he meets up with the Old Man again, there are four Korok seeds in his pocket and a small arsenal of weapons that should get him safely through the next few fights.

Thankfully, it’s finally time for the Old Man to part with the paraglider. It feels… underwhelming, to be honest. There’s just something lacklustre about it; Link can finally leave but, strangely enough, he doesn’t really want to. It’s comfortable here, with the snowy mountains and lush forests. The world feels more alive than ever.

Then it grows serious again, the façade of an old man dripping into something regal. Finally, Link’s temple grows into the Temple of Time, holding the secrets of history within its run-down walls, rather than just his simple, distant prayer. The Old Man’s back straightens up, no longer hunched as if he was making himself smaller. The black and grey clothes that once seemed very practical transform into flowing robes, shrouding him in blues and golds. Lastly, Link notices the stationary flames that shine an ice-breath blue, frozen like the lizalfos the colour is named after. 

Only, it grows worse, further still, when he is informed that this man, who he had been so flippant with, was Rhoam Bosphoramus Hyrule, the last king in an eternity of kings before Calamity Ganon’s reckoning. Link isn’t angry at the revelation, nor sad; more… confused. Why would a Spirit stick around for him?

He ignores the fact he has already been told of his greater purpose in the world, instead choosing to think nothing of it.

Yet, it all flies out the window again, after the king’s spirit has slipped away and melted into the heavens, when he looks upon the lazy afternoon horizon and sees life. In the way that the birds fly in their coordinated formation and how, now that the fog is lifted, there are ruins that scream to be searched. From the bottom of his heart— locked behind the maze of broken walls and remnants of pillars, coated in thick ivy and insulated in a soggy moss— as he feels something reawaken in him. 

Maybe that is what reawakens the calling in his soul. No, it wasn’t the voice in the shrine, nor the prophecy that predicted its happening; it was the land that was still ripe with life and eager to be picked, explored until it was exhausted from its tastes and scents and secrets.

A new feeling takes over his previous weariness: something akin to Courage, which makes his body burn with the need to move, to discover, to _assist_.

The metal on his back, which presses against his spine, almost hums, though Link knows that the feeling doesn’t come from the rusted sword found at the bottom of an unnamed lake. Instead, it’s a distant echo of what used to sit in its place, from the sword of legends and the spirit that resided within.

As long as it may have been— whether it had been a century or a millennium— their connection would not be severed. Not as long as there was still the eternal life of adventure.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading & i hope you enjoyed! it was a very fun piece to write and it was inspired by my friend's story [Yours Truly](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17561315) (which is an excellent read and you should definitely check out!) as it describes link waking up and just touching the body that he doesn't remember.
> 
> you can find me on twitter here: [general](https://twitter.com/1uniore), [tgcf/mdzs](https://twitter.com/hexuaner)
> 
> feel free to leave a comment! ♡


End file.
